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LIHUE >> A kamaaina family land battle on Kauai partly driven by Facebook’s billionaire CEO Mark Zuckerberg was tentatively decided Friday at a public auction punctuated by shouts of disgust.
Bidding at the auction for a total of 2 acres within Zuckerberg’s 700-acre estate on Kauai’s north shore reached $1.7 million as protesters criticized what they regard as an injustice and unfair forced sale of lands that had long been in their family.
“That’s our aina (land),” proclaimed Alika Guerrero, whose family has fractional ownership in the land along with up to 300 close and distant relatives. “It’s a family against a billionaire. That’s what this is. One family against a billionaire.”
Other protesters shouted “Hewa!” and “Aole!” — meaning “wrong” and “no” — as representatives of two bidders related to the man who bought the land in 1894 competed against each other in more hushed tones as they communicated their bids for four separate parcels.
The main winner was Carlos Andrade, a retired University of Hawaii professor of Hawaiian studies who submitted a total of $1.06 million in bids for the largest three parcels that include taro fields, a cottage and a waterfall.
A cousin of Andrade’s, Wayne Rapozo, led a group of family members who include Guerrero that bid eight times to outdo Andrade for the smallest parcel, a 5,227-square-foot vacant house lot. Rapozo, a London lawyer who bid by phone through Kauai attorney Craig De Costa, made the high bid of $700,000.
“Unreal,” Guerrero said as the bidding went on outside state courthouse in Lihue. “$700,000 for our own aina. Crazy!”
Kuleana lands
All four parcels were once owned by Manuel Rapozo, a Portuguese sugar cane plantation worker who acquired the lands 125 years ago. After Rapozo died, the land passed to his heirs and, over time, to subsequent generations of farther-flung relatives.
The Rapozo parcels are kuleana lands, which refer to real estate initially acquired by Hawaii citizens through the Kuleana Act of 1850. The owners have certain rights that include crossing surrounding property for access.
Zuckerberg partnered with Andrade to file a quiet title lawsuit in 2016 that asked a judge to force Rapozo family members to sell their fractional interests in their land because it would not be possible to subdivide the property into equitable pieces for so many people.
The lawsuit claimed there could be as many as 300 partial owners.
Andrade, who had cared for and lived on the property in recent decades while also paying property taxes for the land, said he wanted to acquire the parcels for his immediate family and his descendents. He also said he could not afford the expensive quiet title litigation, so he partnered with Zuckerberg.
Zuckerberg, who acquired his 700 acres in 2015 for about $100 million, had bought fractional interests in the Rapozo parcels from some of Manuel Rapozo’s descendents, giving him standing to file the lawsuit in late 2016.
After heavy public criticism, Zuckerberg apologized and withdrew as a plaintiff in the case in early 2017, leaving Andrade to press ahead.
At Friday’s auction, two lawyers representing a Zuckerberg company that initiated the lawsuit and holds interests in the Rapozo family parcels stood by observing but did not otherwise participate.
Rapozo family members opposed to Andrade’s efforts suspect that Zuckerberg is financing Andrade’s quest, which has included more than two years of expensive litigation and the purchase bids.
In a statement, Wayne Rapozo, who was born and raised on Kauai and acquired his interest in the parcels from relatives last year because he descended from a brother of Manuel Rapozo, called Andrade a “local token front man” being used by a billionaire to extinguish property rights through a forced sale.
“Under any reasonable assessment, Carlos cannot fund this quiet title operation or the purchase of four kuleana at auction on his own without outside resources,” he said. “While Mark Zuckerberg dropped the case after initial public outcry in January 2017, it is reasonable by all facts and circumstances that Mark Zuckerberg and/or persons controlled by or under common control with Mark Zuckerberg are funding and driving the case itself and matters related to the case to wipe out the Rapozo family ownership of the four kuleana parcels.”
Harvey Cohen, a Kauai attorney who submitted bids on Andrade’s behalf, declined to say whether Zuckerberg is helping Andrade with finances to carry out the litigation and purchase efforts.
Andrade, who lives on Kauai, did not attend the auction. He said in a commentary published in The Garden Island newspaper Friday that he moved to one of the parcels more than 40 years ago at the suggestion of an aunt, and since then has cared for the land without anyone else from the Rapozo clan attempting to use the land or pay property taxes.
“It’s not practical for hundreds of individuals, many of whom don’t know each other, with fractional interests in a small parcel of land to cohabitate,” he wrote. “I feel that the only recourse is to allow the legal system to finally resolve the relevant issues. I pursue these actions of my own volition in order to make that dream a reality.”
Family connection
Other family members contend it is wrong for any one family member to acquire their shared land from the rest by legal force instead of sharing and maintaining a family connection to land.
“We feel betrayed,” said Cecilia Rapozo Inanod, a cousin of Andrade’s. “It’s a sad day for us.”
The noon auction began with a $230,000 bid from Andrade for the smallest parcel, and bidding bounced back and forth until the $700,000 offered by Wayne Rapozo.
After that a parcel with a waterfall went for $300,000 to Andrade after just one competing bid by Rapozo. Andrade bids of $460,000 for a 1.6-acre parcel featuring taro fields and $300,000 for a parcel with a cottage went without competing bids.
The auction results are subject to confirmation by a state judge at a future hearing at which new bids that are at least 5 percent higher than those submitted Friday will be considered and could result in completed sales. Proceeds from a sale are to be divided according to fractional interests in the land held by each owner.
Wayne Rapozo said by email that if his group is successful in winning any of the parcels at the confirmation hearing, then he plans to create some kind of fair use of the property for family members.
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